Posts Tagged ‘NBC’

In an appearance on ABC’s This Week, House Democratic Caucus Chairman John Larsen stated with specificity that the proponents of Obamacare now have the 216 votes they need to pass Obamacare later today through the House of Representatives.
Here’s the NBC News twitter feed reporting Larsen’s comment:

‘We have the votes now — as we speak’ to pass Obama’s health care bill, chairman of Democratic caucus says on ABC’s ‘This Week’

It could be a bluff, but this news certainly is a bad sign for the majority of Americans who oppose the Obamacare package while it is great news for President Obama, who, if Larsen is correct, will undoubtedly receive glowing media coverage and perhaps a bounce in the polls should his health care package receive 216 votes later today.

Part of the 10's of Thousands Protesting Obamacare In Front of Capitol Hill

So far today, at least 25,000 protesters have arrived in Washington DC to show disapproval of the pending Obamacare legislation

In a rally against Obamacare called for only twenty four hours ago, at least 25,000 Americans have now arrived in Washington, DC to protest the potential House passage of the comprehensive health care reform package known as Obamacare. Right now, various speakers are talking to the growing crowd in front of Capitol Hill as every major highway into Washington DC remain jammed with cars, trucks and buses carrying yet more protesters to join the rally against Obamacare. Of course, the establishment media is ignoring this growing flash protest on Capitol Hill and instead only reporting on the claimed momentum of undecided votes turning in favor of Obama’s gigantic comprehensive health care plan. The President’s media allies, of course, are under-reporting the turnout for the Obamacare protest, with NBC claiming that only 2,000 are on the lawn in front of Capitol Hill, which is obviously false based on the few pictures we’ve posted here. We’ll be updating this post and creating new ones throughout the day as more Obamacare protesters arrive in DC.

BUENA BOROUGH–Federal sources have confirmed that a man from Buena is in custody in the Middle East, and they say he’s believed to be an Al-Qaeda militant who’s accused of going on a deadly rampage.

“We don’t know nothing, we’re trying to hear something,” said Charles Mobley. Those were the only words he would share on camera about his son, 26 year-old Sharif Mobley. Federal sources have confirmed the 2002 Buena Regional High School graduate is currently in custody in the Middle East, suspected of being an Al-Qaeda militant.

“I remember him from high school,” said Dawn Bass, “he was just outgoing, he wanted to be, like the center of attention. He was a nice kid.”

Which is why those who knew him are shocked to learn that reports from the Middle East say Mobley was recently arrested with several others in Yemen, for allegedly plotting attack for Al-Qaeda. But that’s not all, according to those reports, Mobley, who was apparently hospitalized in Yemen’s capital for an unknown reason, allegedly killed a police guard and seriously wounded another over the weekend, in a failed attempt to escape. “It’s shocking,” said Bass, “I wouldn’t expect anybody that I graduated with to do something like that.”

Mobley’s mother didn’t want to speak on camera, but told us that the accusations are completely false and that her son is not a terrorist. “I haven’t talked to him or seen him in a couple of years,” said Bass, “anything can happen, people change so quickly, and this world, it’s just a crazy place anymore. It’s really scary.”

Mobley’s mother who spoke to us inside her Buena home says the last time she spoke to her son, it was late January, and he was in Yemen. While she does confirm that they were recently visited by the FBI, she says her son is an excellent person who’s never been in trouble and is a good Muslim.

Officially, the FBI will not comment on the case, but sources say federal investigators have an interest in Mobley and are waiting for more information to come out of Yemen.

Yesterday's disclosure of the arrest of "Jihad Jane" (pictured above) was followed up today with confirmation from federal authorities that New Jersey man Sharif Mobley has been detained in Yemen

A member of the Yemeni intelligence service confirmed Thursday that the man, originally described in statements as foreign, was a Somali-American. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to talk to the media.

He was originally arrested as part of an earlier sweep against al-Qaida, according to other security officials, and was in prison on charges of membership of the group. He complained of being ill and was admitted to the hospital, where was held under heavy guard while he was treated for around a week until his escape attempt, said a member of the security forces.

Officials say he snatched a gun from one security guard and shot him, then made his way down from his fifth-floor room to the ground floor. Witnesses say he then got into a shootout with hospital security guards, who pinned him down until a unit of the anti-terrorism police apprehended him.

Today’s confirmation of American Jihadist and Buena, New Jersey resident Sharif Mobley’s arrest and subsequent deadly escape attempt continues a troubling trend of American citizens becoming involved in Jihadist activities both here in the United States and abroad over the past year or so.

UPDATE: the NY Daily News adds an interesting detail to Mobley’s story – apparently Mobley was paid by the campaign of former Governor Jon Corzine (D-NJ) in 2005 to assist Corzine in his turnout drive:

Campaign finance records show Mobley received $75 as an election day worker for Gov. Jon Corzine’s campaign in 2005.

In a stunning move only attempted once in presidential election history, the Obama campaign today finalized a deal to purchase an entire half hour block of broadcasting time from a major network. CBS sold Obama a half hour of time on Wednesday, October 29th, starting at 8:00PM. It appears Obama will present his closing argument to the American people in this fashion as negotiations are also ongoing with NBC and Fox for a similar half hour block of evening broadcasting.

The news of Obama’s strong network buy comes at time when John McCain’s campaign stands at its nadir and possibly its last legs. Three of the four debates are over, and both instant polls and later larger surveys of each debate show the public siding with the Democratic ticket. More troubling for the McCain campaign is the strong voter move to Obama over the past few weeks as world’s stock markets have steadily sold off with no end in sight. Indeed, today’s selloff of the Dow Jones Industrial Average pushed below 9000, the first time the Dow Jones has seen such depths since August of 2003, to close at 8,579.19. Over 20% of of the Dow Jones has been lost in the past seven trading days, nearing the 22.6% selloff on Black Monday in 1987.

Obama’s purchase of blocks of primetime network time follows in the footsteps of Ross Perot in 1992, the only prior presidential candidate to buy such half hour blocks of network time. In 1992, Perot purchased blocks of time on NBC and even beat some of the other networks for ratings at the time. Considering Obama’s popularity, Obama’s primetime show will undoubtably beat Perot’s numbers and perhaps all other competing broadcasting.

The move into blocks of network time comes on the heels of Obama’s purchase of an entire satellite channel, Channel 73, on the Dish TV network last week. Channel 73 is looping an effective two minute Obama economy ad entitled Barack Obama’s Plan for America. The fundraising advantage of the Obama campaign enables such large and unprecedented media buys and sets up Obama for a strong closing message.

Against that backdrop, the McCain campaign continued with a focus on Obama’s relationship with ex-terrorist William Ayers and explaining McCain’s debate night proposal to buy up mortgages directly and renegotiate them downward with the homeowners. Neither initiative appears to have picked up steam, and the media narrative continues to be dominated by discussion of Obama’s surge in popularity since the economic crisis began.

Centrist, independent and moderate voters are moving strongly towards Obama, and McCain has yet to find the right message to stem that tide. Considering the shocked reaction of many Americans to the recent stock market collapse, and Obama’s skillful linkage of this crash to the GOP as the market’s “final verdict” on GOP’s economic policies, no message may fit the bill for McCain.

McCain now stands nearly 10 points behind in most national tracking polls, with the esteemed Gallup tracking poll showing Obama with a commanding, campaign-best 11 point lead, 52-41%. State polls are following suit, with McCain at his lowest support level of the campaign in battlegrounds such as Virginia, Indiana, North Carolina, Missouri, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Florida. With only one debate to go and less than four weeks until election day, the McCain campaign is teetering on the edge of a collapse in support which would result in a electoral landslide not seen since Reagan’s victory over Mondale in 1984.